RCVS and VN Councils elections 2017: quiz the candidates

9 February 2017

We have now announced the candidates standing in the 2017 RCVS Council and Veterinary Nurses (VN) Council elections and are, once again, inviting veterinary surgeons and veterinary nurses to put their questions to them directly in this year’s ‘Quiz the candidates’.

There are 16 candidates contesting six places in the RCVS Council, including three existing Council members eligible for re-election and 13 candidates not currently on Council. They are:

Dr Caroline Allen MRCVS

Miss Sarah Brown MRCVS

Mr Danny Chambers MRCVS

Mr John Davies MRCVS

Dr Chris Gray MRCVS

Mr David Leicester MRCVS

Dr Tom Lonsdale MRCVS

Mr Martin Peaty MRCVS

Mr Matthew Plumtree MRCVS

Dr Cheryl Scudamore FRCVS

Dr Huw Stacey MRCVS

Dr Christopher Tufnell MRCVS

Mr Kevin Watts MRCVS

Dr Trevor Whitbread MRCVS

Dr Thomas Witte MRCVS

Mr James Yeates FRCVS

Four veterinary nurses are contesting two places in this year’s VN Council elections. Two of these are existing VN Council members eligible for re-election while two candidates are not currently on VN Council. They are:

Mr Miguel Borralho RVN

Mrs Susan Howarth RVN

Mrs Andrea Jeffery RVN

Miss Marie Rippingale RVN

Ballot papers and candidates’ details are due to be posted to all veterinary surgeons and veterinary nurses eligible to vote during the week commencing 13 March, and all votes must be cast, either online or by post, by 5pm on Friday 28 April 2017.

Once again we are inviting members of both professions to ‘Quiz the candidates’ by putting their questions directly to all those standing for election. Each candidate will then be invited to choose two questions to answer from all those received, and produce a video recording of their answers. Recordings will be published on Thursday 16 March.

The biographies and statements for each candidate in the RCVS Counciland VN Council electionsare available.

Eleanor Ferguson, RCVS Registrar, said: “This year we will be publishing the candidate biographies and statements online ahead of the start of the official voting period. This is to allow both veterinary surgeons and veterinary nurses to be better informed about the candidates and their reasons for standing before they put their questions forward.

“We would strongly encourage all members of the professions to review the candidate profiles and pose questions for them to answer. We hope it will spark some interesting debates about how the profession is regulated.”